This week, Linda Conner Lambeck of the Connecticut Post reported that many campuses face serious challenges in combating alcohol abuse during the first few weeks of the fall term – some administrators refer to this period of the academic year as the “Red Zone.” Thriving fake ID businesses on campuses across the country perpetuate this problem, as students routinely break the law in order to have access to alcohol. A recent story in Newsday detailed the sources of these fakes, from on-campus entrepreneurs (some of whom produce hundreds of false ID’s) to online shops that market “novelty” ID’s and do-it-yourself kits. Printing and imaging technology is getting better and cheaper, making it easy for an enterprising college student to run an on-campus business. Newsday reporter Alfonso Castillo noted, “Where there’s a will – and perhaps a decent laser printer – there’s a way to score a realistic identification card that might convince a bar bouncer or grocery store clerk that an underage college student is old enough to drink beer or liquor.” As students find creative new sources for fake IDs, a technological arms race ensues: “much as one drink leads to another, the state’s efforts to step up security features on official IDs forces counterfeiters to step up their technology, which in turn forces bars and other establishments to step up their own security to make sure they don’t get taken by an underage drinker.” In the end, it becomes increasingly more difficult for businesses to spot the fakes: Virginia Guy, executive director of the Drug Education Council in Mobile, Alabama, said, “It would be real hard to catch these fakes at a typical bar at night, in the dark, with a bouncer at the door.” As long as our alcohol policies maintain the status quo, these problems aren’t going anywhere. A more effective solution to this problem would address the culture that drives young adults to engage in these ethical compromises in the first place.